


and it feels like freedom

by Diamantspitzhacke (RedSoleWrites)



Category: Dream SMP - Fandom, Minecraft (Video Game), Video Blogging RPF
Genre: Catharsis, Flashbacks, Flying, Gen, Healing, SPOILERS BRO, Tommy has PTSD, anyways TRIDENT FLYING FIC, but if you all want something happy or cathartic then you've come to the right place, in this household we let tommy be happy, like he was just so happy being able to fly, like please child get some therapy, post January 21st stream, post january 20th stream, so i'm gonna write about him being able to fly
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-22
Updated: 2021-01-22
Packaged: 2021-03-14 01:42:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,882
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28913280
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RedSoleWrites/pseuds/Diamantspitzhacke
Summary: He steps into the sea.He rears back to launch the trident.And suddenly, Tommy is free.He raises his new trident to his shoulder.He lines it up with the next tower.He throws it.And suddenly, Tommy is free.aka the "Tommy Flies and Thinks Thoughts that Aren't Bad" fic
Relationships: No Romantic Relationship(s)
Comments: 3
Kudos: 62





	and it feels like freedom

**Author's Note:**

> was i supposed to write something else? yes  
> will i write that something else? most likely  
> but for now, i'm going to experience catharsis by writing Tommy flying and having a Good Time  
> yes i listened to innocence by madeon and thought of That One Frame from the late august animatic the whole time what about it  
> anyways have fun friends this is a fic of good feelings

Exhausted and stressed from his visit to Dream, Tommy walks the Prime Path back towards his house – _his house! He can go back to it now!_ – while his mind wanders. He’s trying to process all of his conflicting emotions.

Elation, at finally being freed from Dream’s iron grip.

Regret, for all the things he’s done to the other people on the server.

Conflict, his mind swirling at his treatment of Dream and Dream’s treatment of him.

Uncertainty, unsure of what to do with the clear path to the future laid out ahead of him.

However, his physical path is no longer so clear.

“Hey, Tommy, how’d it go?” Ranboo asks, the half-enderman appearing in Tommy’s vision from who-knows-where. He didn’t teleport, at least Tommy doesn’t think so, but he has a knack for sneakily stumbling his way into things. It’s nice, even if Ranboo’s habit tends to give Tommy near-heart attacks.

He catches his breath, startled, holding a hand to his chest. “Jesus, Ranboo, give a guy some warning!”

“Oh! Um. Sorry.”

Tommy waves him off. “Nah, it’s fine, Big Man. We just need to get you like a bell or something, that’ll solve it.”

“Tubbo already tried that. Apparently, the jingling makes it worse.”

“Huh. Who knew?”

Ranboo shrugs. “Anyways. How’d visiting prison go?”

“Eh.” Tommy waves his hand in a so-so motion. “Sam searched me like three times, was overall super intimidating, and the man refused to bounce back on my jokes!”

“I feel like prisons aren’t very conducive to comedy.”

“It at least would’ve gone better if he gave me _something_ to work with! I even pulled out Justin Bieber, nothing worked!”

“That’s rough, buddy.”

Tommy cycles through his inventory until he finds a weapon, ready to throw hands. “You did not just ‘that’s rough, buddy’ me, Big Man.”

“Oh no.”

“Get back here!”

Ranboo scrambles away from the suddenly swearing Tommy, dodging a swipe and running. Tommy laughs maniacally. It’s freeing, in a way, being able to roughhouse and play around like a kid. Like the kid he used to be.

It’s in the adrenalin running through his veins that doesn’t have any true fear behind it. It’s in the lightness of being able to dodge and weave without any armor. It’s in the knowledge that, if he needs it, he can call a time-out and be able to stop it.

It’s in the fact that this small moment of his time is a choice. Nobody forced it onto him. Nobody gave him an ultimatum. He just chose to laugh and chase his friend and be the Tommy of so long ago.

God, it’s the best feeling in the world.

He’s breathless, unable to contain his mirth while simultaneously running full speed. And there may be a bit of relief causing his breathlessness, too. He can’t tell.

As he follows Ranboo’s long strides down the Prime Path and towards the crater of L’Manberg, he stops. Ranboo, noticing his suddenly missing pursuer, stops too. “Tommy?”

In his hands, forgotten in the rush of the past twenty-four hours, is a trident. _Nightmare_ , reads its label.

“Woah. Where’d you get that?”

Numbly, as he reverently turns the cornflower-blue weapon in his hands, Tommy replies, “It was Dream’s.”

His mind is flung back to that day in exile, one of his lowest points.

_Dream unslings the trident from his back, holding it out to Tommy._

_Tommy sniffs and wipes his cheeks, equally wet from tears and the rain. “I don’t want your pity, Dream. It’s not your fault that nobody came.”_

_“Mmm, true.” Still, Dream’s arm remains outstretched. His offer stays open. “But I know you haven’t gotten the chance to use one of these.”_

_The teen huffs slightly. He turns his head away, but he does grab the trident. Tommy stands from his spot on the beach to properly examine it._

_It’s lighter than he expected. For such a massive weapon, its tips dagger-sharp, it feels delicate in his hands. Like he could break it if he tried._

_He ignores his mind saying_ you’ve broken so much already, what’s one more to add to the tally?

_The trident glimmers slightly with the telltale orchid-purple of enchantments. The sheer rush of power that Tommy feels just holding it is heady. Is this what it feels like to be Dream? To have this kind of thing at your fingertips?_

_“Well?” Dream nudges him forward, his head tilted in a way that makes Tommy picture Wilbur, staring at him with an eyebrow raised and a grin tugging the corner of his mouth. “Aren’t you going to try it out?”_

_Too used to having good things ripped from his hands, Tommy rushes to the water without hesitation. If there’s a note of anxiety in how he grips the trident with a white-knuckled grip, he shoves it to the back of his mind._

_He steps into the sea._

_He rears back to launch the trident._

_And suddenly, Tommy is free._

That flight with the trident was exhilarating. For the too-short time it lasted before Dream tugged him back down from orbit, Tommy felt close to himself again.

“Tommy?” Ranboo asks, waving a hand in front of his face. “You good?”

Tommy shakes himself slightly. “Yeah, yeah. Just, uh.” He backs away sheepishly. “Do you mind if I try something?”

Ranboo nods his approval, and without a second thought, Tommy sprints away. He spots one of Bad’s trident travel towers, placed conveniently nearby. God, he thought these were so ugly before. Now, though, they’re doorways, and they’ve never been more beautiful.

He scales the ladder with nimbleness borne of the kind of practice only the finger-numbing Arctic can bring. Compared to that, this is easy, and Tommy has far more motivation to reach the peak here.

He’s so close.

Thirty feet turns to fifteen to five and suddenly he’s there, soaked to the bone.

He stands in the middle of a pool of water elevated high into the sky. If that isn’t defying natural law, then what he’s about to do definitely is.

Tommy takes a deep breath. He doesn’t have the rain to propel him so high this time. His flight won’t be as endless.

He’s fine with that.

He raises his new trident to his shoulder.

He lines it up with the next tower.

He throws it.

And suddenly, Tommy is free.

_He flies up, up, up, faster and faster until the rain is moving backwards._

_Tommy’s high enough up that the sunrise is lifted up past the horizon. He’s high enough that he’s passed the clouds._

_For a moment, he hangs there, suspended._

He flies, so fast that the wind catches in his face and grips at his nose.

He creates an arc aimed at his destination, and, as the sun shines down upon him, he sees the water glimmer.

For a moment, he hangs there, suspended.

_Then he falls._

Then he falls.

 _Down_ down _down_ down he goes until _he’s falling so fast that the rain can’t catch him_ the next tower shoots closer and closer to his face _and he’s lost track of the ground but as it rushes up to meet him he is uncomfortably reminded_ and he’s nervous that’s he’s missed his mark since he hasn’t exactly had much practice with this _and he lands in the sea, grounded again_ and he lands on the tower, grounded again.

_He hands the trident back to Dream and thanks him for the glimpse of freedom._

For a moment, Tommy feels obligated to toss the trident down, to apologize, to undo what he’s done.

He squashes the thought and launches himself back into the air.

_It’s so peaceful, this high in the sky._

_Dream isn’t there to tell him what to do._

_Nobody is there, really._

_Nobody to judge him, or blame him, or yell at him, or be disappointed in him._

_There is only Tommy, the sky, the stars, the sun, and the moon._

The calculated dance of point-and-shoot with the tridents on the towers isn’t exactly what most people would call peaceful. It’s a hit-or-miss game, where being even slightly off-target would be disastrous.

With the addition of the rush of wind and the flip-flopping of his stomach and the eternal pull of gravity, Tommy should be anything but relaxed.

Yet this is the closest thing he can describe to peace.

He’s long since left Ranboo behind, flying from tower to tower as he gazes over this land that he calls his home. He doesn’t have the presence of mind to feel bad about it.

This feeling is euphoric, addictive. It’s like the feeling of winning over Dream and saving Tubbo, except this time it’s the feeling of saving himself. It’s butterflies and knots all at once. It’s a rush of energy as it sends the quieting emotion of relief through his veins. Tommy wants to cackle at the sky and flip off God even as he wants to break down and cry and grieve for the innocence that was taken from him. He feels like he could fight Techno and win. He feels like a single glance from Dream would shatter him.

And he never wants to stop feeling like this.

The sunshine breaks for a moment as a storm cloud rolls overhead, and Tommy has never been happier.

The rain starts pouring down.

Soaked as he is, Tommy really can’t tell.

He laughs giddily and adjusts himself to aim at the sky.

Gravity is left behind as the world narrows to only Tommy, his trident, and the sky. He twirls as he ascends, climbing higher and higher. Nobody is around to see it. Nobody can stop him.

The name of the trident feels ironic, now. Sure, it was a part of the nightmare of his life. But that was before. The place he’s in now is anything but a nightmare.

For a moment, he considers renaming the trident, like some kind of act of reclamation. _Poetic justice_ , Wilbur would say. _Taking it back_ , Tubbo would say.

He decides to keep calling it Nightmare. To show the world that he escaped one. It feels right. Like the perfect mixture of spite and acceptance.

Tommy continues his climb. He’s almost at the clouds now, and the rain has only increased from a light drizzle to a steady downpour. The server is healing.

Tommy is healing.

He’s smiling so hard that his cheeks hurt but he tastes salt in his mouth. He can’t tell the difference between his tears and the rain.

Tommy crosses the border of the clouds. Through the thick grey nimbus, mist beading on his face and gathering on his eyelashes. Suddenly, he’s broken through, and the rain is gone. It’s just Tommy and the sun and the sky now, the moon barely peeking from the horizon.

He stares into the sun.

Techno would call him Icarus right now.

The thing is, the water is what killed Icarus. There was no sweet embrace from it, only an unforgiving crack and rocks hidden beneath.

Water is what allows Tommy to fly.

He knows his limits. He knows that the water is right beneath him, ready to cushion him and let him spread his wings once again.

Tommy is no Icarus.

He’s just Tommy.

He should feel lonely.

Tommy feels free.

**Author's Note:**

> LOOK AT HIM GO HE WAS SO HAPPY ON STREAM  
> I DIDN'T CHANNEL THAT HAPPINESS IN THE SAME WAY, I DON'T THINK, BUT IT'S STILL A GOOD FEELING  
> WE LOVE TO SEE IT


End file.
